A Soldier's Reunion

Chapter Two

“Manda Panda,” a voice said softly behind her.

Mandy’s spine stiffened. Children giggled. She froze. Military-buzzed heads lifted to stare.

Again, the voice from moments before, and years before, suctioned the last pocket of air from her lungs.

No one had called her that in ten years. Ten.

Not possible. Can’t be him. Can it?

Warmth radiated from a presence behind her. Slightly ragged breathing. Maybe hers and not his. Hard to tell. She felt like she orbited in a pre-surgical anesthesia vortex all of a sudden. She inhaled deep, cleansing breaths and forced the shock from her face and neck. She used every ounce of strength to slowly turn around.

The instant his eyes lit on her face, his mouth slid open.

He stared.

Mandy stared.

Though he was more filled out and his impressive frame was that of a man instead of a boy now, she’d know him anywhere.

“Nolan?” He had to notice her voice sounded like a ventilator gone bad. She hated the breathlessness. Despised the tears stinging at the sight of him. The welcome sight.

No.

Only because he’s a rescuer. Not because he’s Nolan, the only man you’ve ever loved.

Eyes as kind as she remembered explored first her face, then her body, but not in a sensual way. He seemed unable to speak for a moment. Or blink.

“Manda Panda?” It awed out as a whisper.

The spoken name streaked emotional pain through her.

She didn’t want to hear it. No one had the right to call her that anymore. Especially not him.

She lifted her chin. “Mandy.” She hadn’t meant it to be so curt.

Hurt fluttered in his eyes. Then confusion. Disappointment. Concern. Maybe even a little irritation.

He stepped toward her. Ran a hand over his dark-blondish buzz and left it there as he took another slow step. He blew out a forever breath. “I can’t believe it’s you.”

He didn’t blink or take his eyes off her. His gaze reached her hand. “You’re hurt.” He took another step toward her.

Her muscles stiffened. Cold. Be cold. This is the man who broke your heart and never looked back. Never called, never—

She stood rigidly and lifted her shoulders. The way she did when she wanted to look in control, in charge, and professional at the hospital. When she called a cardiac arrest code and needed family and nurses carrying her out her lifesaving orders to believe she knew exactly what she was doing. Though she might be scared crazy. No one else needed to sense the emotion inside. Things went better for everyone that way.

He glanced around. “All children were removed okay?”

She blinked. “Children?”

He motioned a vague hand toward the bridge.

Heat rushed her face. “Oh. Yes. Yes.” She nodded at his uniform…that he more than sufficiently filled out. “Men, dressed like you, lifted them in baskets to helicopters.” She tried not to stare like a dolt. He really could be a poster boy for a military exercise regimen. Gone were those lanky arms and chicken legs she used to tease him about.

She tried to ignore how strong and eerily familiar he felt as he guided her to sit on a padded cooler full of ice and water bottles. His team had lowered it from a helicopter after rescuing everyone from the bridge.

His gaze danced down her face and lit on her neck. His jaw slackened. Lines around his eyes creased as he leaned in.

The panda necklace! That he’d given her at age sixteen. So you’ll never forget me, he’d said.

Her hand snaked up to clench it. Too late. He’d seen.

Surprise glittered over his face. “You still have it.” It came out more like a statement of disbelief than a query.

Not wanting to look like an idiot, Mandy slipped her hand from it. “It softens the children toward me in the hospital, makes them less afraid.”

As if sensing her discomfort—and her omission of the main reason she couldn’t take it off—he politely averted his gaze.

She tried not to look at his left ring finger, though it called to her like an emergency page on night shift. Forced herself not to care that his finger had no ring. Or how soft, warm and capable his hand felt as it brushed expertly over her injuries. He obviously knew what he was doing medically, not just what he was doing to her emotionally.

“Hurt anywhere?”

How ironic the question. Bottomless eyes bored into hers.

“Mostly my wrist.” Mostly.

He ceased staring only to check those areas. Leaning closer, he lowered his voice. “Look, Mandy, I know this is awkward. If you’d rather someone else—”

“I’m fine.” For the most part. What else could she say? Admit her heart still ached from ten-year-old trauma? No. She refused to show herself weak around him again. He’d seen her at her most vulnerable, then rejected and abandoned her. She could never put herself in that position again.

Not liking his knowing, penetrating visual inquiry, she glanced at his uniform. “I see you made it through boot camp.”

That caused him to laugh.

“Barely.” He splinted her wrist then wrapped a sling around her arm. “You know how I was never a morning person. Those o’dark-thirty wake-up calls nearly did me in.”

She fought nostalgia with a vengeance.

“I see you made it through med school.” Pride sparkled as his eyes viewed the title embroidered on her rumpled scrubs.

She nodded because the emotion in his words disabled her voice.

“I’m proud of you, Mandy.” His smile gleamed genuine and warm. His gaze lingered, reaching deep, almost desperate, as if searching for something lost. Yet glowed radiant as in fascinated wonder of something found.

Heat came to her cheeks. She averted her gaze. How had she forgotten how deep his dimples were? How smooth and suave his voice. And how exquisite his eyes.

Cold. Be cold.

Do. Not. Thaw.

She lifted her chin. She supposed he made it through pararescue training, otherwise he wouldn’t be here. Must have been one of those brave, uniformed men making a grand entrance from helicopters. Both of which had enraptured the children’s attention, and helped them momentarily forgo their fears. Had even caused her to forget for a few moments they were all on the brink of death.

How would an elite, world-class airman end up in a small town calamity? Did he live nearby?

Oh, please no. She forced herself to stop wondering about him, the one thing on earth that could undo her and unravel her future. She’d ask Miss Ivy, town matriarch, landlady and owner of Ivy Manor where Mandy lived. She straightened her shoulders and spine and adopted a professional air.

He studied her carefully, almost comically. As if he knew her drill. Using coping mechanisms to prove to both of them his presence wasn’t affecting her.

“I see you’re still military.” She eyed emblems on a maroon beret, peeking out his side pants pocket.

“I see you’re still Manchester.” His gaze dealt heavy inquiry as it dipped to brush her name tag before reaching for her face again. The tender way his eyes held hers reminded her of an all-consuming embrace. His embrace.

She swallowed. Of course she’d never married. Why would she after having her heart ripped out and stomped on by his proverbial combat jump boots? What business was it of his?

She shoved to her feet before her mind could wonder why.

Quick as a blink, he surged closer, hand out as if to steady her, but stopped when she took an unsteady step back.

Disappointment clashed with concern across his face, and something else she couldn’t put her finger on. Regret?

Well, so what? Too late for sorry. It didn’t change the past or kill the pain.

“It’s good to see you.” He cleared his throat when she didn’t nod or agree.

He took a deliberate step back from her and aimed a slow thumb behind him. Same thumb that used to swipe away her tears and tilt her chin up for good-night kisses. Memories brought warmth to her cheeks.

“I’m going to check on the others.” He nodded toward a group of elderly women. “I’ll have one of my teammates direct you to an ambulance.”

She nodded.

He motioned toward her hand. “You need to have those bones X-rayed and set. Of course, being a doctor, I imagine you know that.” He met her gaze and held it like his strong arms had the children going up the hoist rope.

Her mind flashed back ten years ago, to the day he left on a bus to Air Force boot camp. It had taken every ounce of strength not to chase it down the street. While her heart had cried for him to come back, her feet had stayed firmly planted because he’d promised to write every week. In the midst of a heart raging with titanic emotions, her mind and common sense reasoned that he’d enlisted and legally there’d been no getting out of it.

But months later after no letters, her bleeding heart had won, convincing her mind that Nolan had left for something better. Just like her dad had left her mom and Mandy. A better life and she wasn’t part of it.

And she’d felt no less abandoned by Nolan. Especially after all the loneliness, emotional trauma and family tumult he’d helped her through. Doing what he was meant to: rescue. He was doing that now but he’d always shown tendencies.

But she wasn’t that needy person anymore. She clenched trembling fingers against her side as well as her injuries allowed. All the while he gauged her as though searching for signs of life.

Or lack of.

She dipped her head toward other victims. “Go on. I understand triage. And I’m not that hurt.”

His chin lifted and his expression took on a knowing manner, as if he’d picked up on the terse tones of the last sentence.

He pivoted, not seeming to be able to remove his gaze. His mouth moved as if to say something.

Slowly, he walked backward as though seeing her was like witnessing someone dead coming back to life.

Yet there resided a deep pain in his eyes that also looked like he’d just seen someone die who’d previously lived.

“Glad to see you’re okay, Mandy.” His voice sounded unmistakably thick as his eyes, genuine and reminiscently tender, canvassed the dark, swirling water.

At her reply of silence, his wide shoulders drooped as if weighted with something that wasn’t pressing on them before he’d seen her. Slowly, he turned.

And then he was gone. Just like that.

And Mandy could not breathe. Could not think. Could not slow her pulse or still her thoughts from reeling or stop her heart from squeezing. Or keep herself from thinking of chasing after him with all her might.

Again.

Chapter Three

“What’s up, bro?” Brock clapped a hand on Nolan’s shoulder.

Vince hawk-eyed him. “Yeah. Look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

Nolan swallowed. “Feel like I have.”

Petrowski looked up. “Don’t tell me. You just saw that woman you always used to talk about.”

Brock leaned in. “You mean the one he never got over? The reason he won’t go on dates, least not second ones?”

Nolan tensed his jaw and gave a slight nod.

“No way!” Vince stood and eyed Mandy from afar.

“Dude! Seriously?” Brock’s eyes widened.

“Yeah.”

Chance eyed the lot over Nolan’s shoulder. “That her?”

Nolan nodded, turning with his team and commander to watch Mandy.

Joy and sadness played ring-around-the-rosy with his heart as he watched her interact with the children and tend their scrapes and bumps despite her injury.

Chance moved to stand next to Nolan. “Didn’t y’all part ways so she could go to med school when you joined the military?”

“Yeah.”

Petrowski pivoted. “As natural and calm as she was with those children back there, obviously she realized her dream.”

Nodding, Nolan pulled out his beret and settled it on his head.

“At the expense of your relationship, though,” Brock said.

“I encouraged her to go. At the time I couldn’t have offered her as much as medical school.” Nolan shrugged, but the niggling feeling of failing Mandy and the hard goodbye they’d had the day he left wouldn’t recede. “She’d have lost her funding had I not kept up my end of the bargain.” Had he fought for what he wanted—made a way for him and Mandy to be together—her dreams would have been flushed down the drain by those in authority, who wanted nothing more than Nolan away from her.

To get in their way would have resulted in Mandy losing her chance to do the one thing she’d always dreamed: help salvage the lives of children.

As she’d done amazingly today with outstanding bravery and grit.

“What I did was for the best. For both of us.” Now whom was he trying to convince? Needing a moment of space, Nolan stepped away from his closest friends and eyed the horizon where purple streaked into pink above the bridge that sat cockeyed over Refuge River. In fact…

Reunion Bridge. The hair on Nolan’s neck and arms prickled.

No coincidence. God had meant them to meet again.

Why?

And why when he was in the midst of having to use every bit of time and energy to be proactive at finding a way out of being taken from his team? And from Refuge, a town he’d come to love. And now from Mandy, right when they’d reunited. Nolan wished Joel was here. And Manny. They’d help him make sense of it all.

He could look to Petrowski, but Aaron was in the same boat as Nolan and then some. Aaron—a single dad and trying to be there for his little boys and his “big” ones, the Pararescue team.

No, Nolan couldn’t burden Petrowski further. He’d find a way on his own and trust in God’s help.

One by one, the guys knuckled his shoulders and cupped hands on his back, then turned as a unit and started walking off.

Nolan took a step to follow, then turned back. Unable to leave or even look away just yet.

“Ready, Briggs? Or you gonna stand here and gawk at that gorgeous doctor all day?” Petrowski said moments later.

“Gorgeous is right.” Mandy had always been pretty. But this woman Mandy had grown into could kick any guy’s testosterone into high gear. And his pulse. Yeah. Definitely his pulse.

One more moment. He’d linger. He’d look. But the more he looked, the more he couldn’t look away. His heart had hoisted to her the moment he’d seen her again. And heard her voice. And looked into her mesmerizing cat-shaped eyes. Shimmery green. Like sleek, waxen southern Illinois soybean fields.

Eyes that still held a decade-old hurt.

Memories he’d forgotten assaulted him in waves as he remembered all they’d shared.

He faced Petrowski. “Even before we were sweethearts, we were inseparable growing up. Neighborhood buddies. Confidants.” Nolan smiled, recalling a particular blackberry bush burglary. “Partners in crime at times. Best friends.”

Soul mates.

The thought shook something loose. A determination he didn’t know he possessed blasted forth. He lifted his binoculars, aimed her way.

An unseen pressure moved them back down.

Chance grinned. “Dude, that borders on stalking.”

Nolan lowered the binoculars and tucked them away, wishing he could do the same with the film of memories reeling through his mind right now.

“You still have a thing for her?” Vince reached for the binoculars. “Lemme see why.”

Nolan laughed and knocked away his hand. “Not on your life.”

“You two have a history.” Petrowski’s world-wise eyes smiled. “Strange you’d meet again. Here. This way.”

“What kinda history?” Brock waggled his reddish brows.

Nolan shook his head. “Not that kind. She was a good girl.” Who fell for the bad boy. At least that’s what Mandy’s mother and her pastor claimed. Their influence had been like a tumor in his and Mandy’s relationship, metastasizing it with the poison of pious principles.

Nolan hadn’t shared Mandy’s family’s faith. Therefore she was off-limits, according to them and the Bible they quoted. The book he’d wanted nothing to do with because he feared it would judge him as harshly and unmercifully as they did.

Now, as a new Christian, he understood completely. But at the time, their judgmental precepts had incited and incised him.

“Where are they transporting?” Nolan asked Petrowski and forced his feet to move. He observed a Red Cross volunteer finishing up paperwork with Mandy and directing her to the far end of the parking lot with waiting ambulances.

“Refuge Memorial for now. Completely swamped from so many bridge victims being brought in. So patients will be diverted elsewhere.”

Nolan shucked off his jumpsuit, glad he’d worn jeans and a T-shirt beneath. “So all injured are being taken there initially?”

Zips sounded as Aaron shirked his own suit. “Far as I know.”

“I can go talk with her there. We never had proper closure.” Nolan wadded his suit and tossed it in his rucksack.

Aaron tilted his head. “And, according to her response back there, you need to.”

“Exactly right.” He couldn’t let this go. Not again. He didn’t realize the impact of that open wound until the moment they’d laid eyes on one another after a decade of zero contact.

They needed to talk, if nothing more than to ease shut the chapter of a very painful book. He’d seen it in her eyes.

He’d hurt her. Majorly wronged her.

And he needed to make it right.

“How rude,” Mandy muttered to herself as she stepped away from the volunteer, and Nolan’s scrutiny. Ow, did her hand hurt. Starting to swell, too. A blue-black discoloration had begun. Hand elevated, she trudged toward the distant line of ambulances she’d been directed to. Maybe they’d have pain relievers on board. And another ice pack. To cool off her wrist.

And her temper.

Nolan and his friends had been openly staring and talking about her. Without trying to hide it. What kind of friends did he have nowadays? She couldn’t hear what they said but knew for certain she was the object of conversation.

And she had felt Nolan’s stare above the rest.

Where was he?

She started to look around but stopped herself. She’d jump off the bridge before she’d broadcast how badly he’d rattled her. He had to be tracking her. She could still perceive him. Right now. Gaze drilled into her back right to her heart.

No matter.

This freakish accident tumbled them together but she wasn’t about to make anything out of it. He’d better not follow her to the hospital, either. She had nothing to say to him. Nothing.

Never mind small pings of joy that he would actually make an effort to come see her. Why would he?

The cold, sharp truth smarted like a dull needle. She hadn’t meant enough to him ten years ago or he would have found a way.

And she would not risk her heart to a man like that again. She’d have to mean more to him than his dreams.

To be fair, she hadn’t considered giving up hers, either. Couldn’t have expected Nolan to give up his. He really hadn’t had a choice whereas she had but hadn’t taken it.

Seeing how he rescued people today made her glad he hadn’t. The world needed men like that, willing to risk their lives so others can live. Their relationship had been a casualty of his creed and her cause.

She was no longer on his radar. Not even close. No use hoping for a relationship that had ended a decade ago.

Sweat trickled down Mandy’s back as she continued her trek across asphalt so hot it probably melted the tread on her soles. An EMT approached. “Think you can ride sitting up, Dr. Manchester?” he asked as she reached the line of open-door ambulances that had come from towns around to assist.

“Yes.”

Reece, Caden and Jayna sat like three lost baby ducks in a row inside a middle ambulance. The urge to shelter them hit her. How she loved children. She had an especially tender heart for fragile ones. She nodded that way. “If there’s room in there, I’ll ride with them.”

“Sure. But might be a bit before transport since we may need to stick a couple others in it.” He eyed her injuries.

Mandy nodded. “That’s fine.”

Hand lent, the EMT assisted her inside, and closed the door.

“Miss Mandy!” Reece scooted over and patted a place beside her. Bless the child’s assessment that her bottom could actually fit in that small space.

Caden must have noticed Mandy’s dilemma. He unlatched the strap across his thighs and moved to the bench.

“Scoot an itty bit more,” Mandy said, then sat between Reece and Jayna.

Grinning, Reece fisted her hand and lifted it to Mandy.

She smiled. “Just what am I supposed to do with that?”

Jayna giggled. “You go like this.” She fisted her hand and bumped Reece’s knuckles.

“Hi-fives aren’t hip anymore?”

Caden scowled. “No way. Neither is ‘hip.’ It’s older’n my grandma’s dinosaur’s grandma.”

Reece and Jayna erupted in giggles and squashed themselves up against her.

“Hey, Caden, I never did catch your last name.” Mandy wiggled her nose at the little boy.

“Boyle,” he said. Mandy caught sight of Nolan walking past. Looking for something? Someone? Her heart slammed against her sternum when he passed by, then disappeared from sight.

God, I miss him. Hurts too much to hope…

Mandy consciously repressed it all.

“Chief Boyle…” Mandy tilted her face in a dreamy lilt, making pretense of eyeing the ceiling, while actually looking for emergency items. Habit she supposed. “I do believe I like the sound of that.”

The children chortled.

Mandy joined them and felt the unprecedented stress of an unbearably hard day melt away. “Well all-right-y then. Fist bumps are what people do nowadays.” She raised hers and bumped each child, causing bubbly giggles to fill the ambulance.

The door opened and the EMT poked his head inside. “Dr. Manchester, you well enough to be the transport medic if I stay and ready other patients for air evacuation?”

“Absolutely. I’m right in my element here.” She smiled.

So did the EMT. “Any questions on where stuff is?”

She looked around, catching sight of the most important things. Oxygen. IV equipment. Code meds, though none of these children would need any of that. She searched for a seatbelt for the booth. “How do I secure them in?”

The EMT whose nametag read “Cole” tugged a clasp from a crack between padded benches. “Any other questions?”

“Why yes, in fact I do. Did you know fist bumps are in and hi-fives are old news?”

Cole laughed. “I’d heard fist bumps were a wave of the future.” He lifted his hand and touched gentle knuckles to each child, then Mandy’s. “Thank you.” He cast a deeply thankful look to her and closed the door.